72
Metascore
26 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80The GuardianJordan HoffmanThe GuardianJordan HoffmanIf you are going to see one outlandish and occasionally nauseating bloodbath samurai pic this year, this is the one.
- 80Village VoiceSimon AbramsVillage VoiceSimon AbramsCome for the gory swordplay, stay for the half-serious melodrama.
- 75Slant MagazineChuck BowenSlant MagazineChuck BowenTakashi Miike's film is a work of robust genre craftsmanship that's informed with a sly sense of self-interrogation.
- 75Philadelphia Daily NewsGary ThompsonPhiladelphia Daily NewsGary ThompsonThe movie also runs 2 hours, 20 minutes, which is a lot of dead samurai. The violence is often numbing, and the translations — the movie is subtitled — are sometimes as deadly as the swordsmanship. On the other hand, Blade of the Immortal is flat-out gorgeous. Widescreen, lush, beautiful.
- 70The Hollywood ReporterHarry WindsorThe Hollywood ReporterHarry WindsorMiike’s facility for the sharply sketched portrait, in between bouts of bladed mayhem, remains as shrewd as ever.
- 70Screen DailyLee MarshallScreen DailyLee MarshallMiike is on fine form, never losing his sense of humour, or sense of character, even as yet another axe is embedded in yet another skull.
- 70VarietyMaggie LeeVarietyMaggie LeeThe story’s supernatural elements enable Miike to take huge liberties with chanbara, the oldest genre in Japanese cinema, and break free from rigid traditions of choreographing swordplay sequences.
- 70The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisThe New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisThough not nearly as mindful or meaty as Mr. Miike’s 2011 triumph, 13 Assassins, “Blade” is creatively gory fun.
- 63The Seattle TimesSoren AndersenThe Seattle TimesSoren AndersenBlade of the Immortal is a pretty good title for a samurai movie. I’ve got a better one: “10,000 Corpses.”